A Discussion Outline on Attitudes Toward Prohibition—page 65 


THE INQUIRY _ 


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VOL. I, No. 7 


daylight, deliberately slips 
the skids at even intervals 
under the whole length and 
breadth of its foundation, 
almost any adventurous ob- 
server is willing to get on 
board just for the sake of 
the ride. 


What happened at the 
gateway of Russia in the 
Finnish capital early in 
August was undoubtedly of 
considerable significance to 
the Y. M. C. A. which was 
holding its world confer- 
ence there. It was of al- 
most equal importance to 
that great company of peo- 
ple who, having not much 
contact with, or use for, the 
Yom GA’ yet are inter- 
ested in newer methods of 
social education. For, the 
Helsingfors conference ex- 
hibited in an extraordinary 
way and on a broad scale 
efforts to introduce demo- 
cratic methods and a 
thorough-going discussional 
technique into an interna- 
tional gathering. 


There are both opponents 
and friends of the Y. M. 
C. A. in many countries 
who would find themselves 
somewhat in sympathy with 
the following paragraphs in 
an address delivered at the 
plenary meeting of the Ex- 


ecutive Committee of the Communist Youth Internationale, 
in Moscow, 1926. The paragraphs are quoted from a re- 
port that appeared in the Jugend Internationale (Vienna). 


Occasional Papers Published on the Top 
Floor of 129 East 52d Street, New York 


ss 


Helsingfors 


A Step Toward International Understanding 


HEN a semi-capitalistic and predominantly 
V\ orthodox organization gets on the skids, there 
is no telling how far it will slither. 
manufactures its own skids for its own use and, in broad 


When it 





THE HELSINGFORS CALENDAR 


1921—World’s Committee of Y. M. C. A., meet- 
ing at Utrecht, authorized a study of the Associ- 
ation’s relation to industrial, social, racial, and 
international problems. 

1922—At Copenhagen, the World’s Committee in- 
structed the executive of the Alliance in con- 
sultation with the National Councils to proceed 
with the inquiry. 

1924—-Decision reached to get new data from the 
mind of youth itself. Questionnaires and study 
outlines, developed from actual discussions 
among youth, prepared in 22 languages and used 
in 40 countries. This inquiry proceeded through 
1925, 37 national Alliances eventually sending 
summaries of studies to the central office at 
Geneva. 

May, 1925—At its Budapest meeting the World’s 
Committee decided to attempt a democratic 
organization of the program of the Helsingfors 
conference. 

Autumn, 1925—Selection of delegates began. To 
ensure real representation, national Alliances 
were requested to appoint as delegates only 
those who had taken part in actual study. 


January, 1926—Conference at Geneva of some 70 
leaders from 20 countries reviewed preliminary 
national reports, and prepared syllabus for final 
period of study. 

June, 1926—Assignment of the 1,500 delegates to 50 
international groups of thirty, each group to be 
led by a team of three, representing three nation- 
alities and two languages. 


July 28-31, 1926—Conference at Helsingfors of the 50 
teams of leaders for training in group leadership. 

August 1-6, 1926—Sessions of Helsingfors conference. 
Decision reached to continue the processes of 
study begun, by means of local study groups, 
international research, regional conferences and 
literature—all looking toward revision of pres- 
ent Association programs. 





the next few years. 


é 
4 


4 \ \ 





The World’s Alliance of the Y. M. C. A. begins to organize the 
young laborers in view of their social and economic needs and this 
even in America, where the young laborers, as compared to other 
countries, are tolerably well situated. 

This is only a beginning, and we do not know whether it will 


be possible for them to realize 
their aims, but it is significant 
that they find it necessary to 
look for other methods in order 
to get in among the young 
laborers and group them to- 
gether. It proves that this 
organization has understood the 
part the young laborers will 
play in the near future and how 
necessary it is to try every pos- 
sible method to draw them away 
from the influence of the Com- 
munist Youth Internationale. 


The Y. M. C. A.’s, which are 
strongly influenced from Amer- 
ica, are specially interested in 
the questions which are directly 
connected with the interests of 
American imperialism, and ] am 
sure we are not mistaken in say- 
ing that in the next few years 
we shall have to fight this organ- 
ization as our chief enemy in 
a number of countries. This 
organization will this year hold 
a conference in Helsingfors, 
and at this conference the con- 
ditions of the young laborers of 
Europe will not be studied, al- 
though some European groups 
have desired this. This will, 
however, according to the Ger- 
man periodicals of this organ- 
ization, be done in the national 
Alliances. But what have they 
on their program? The race 
question, the Negro question; 
questions which are exactly those 
which interest America in the 
first place, and which are most 
clearly connected with the fur- 
thering of the imperialistic plans 
of America. The race question 
is taken up for study, because 
it is desired to support the 
American policy on the Far 
East, the Negro question is 
taken up because the exploita- 


tion of the Negroes in America will be of decisive importance in 


_ Comrades, we must clearly observe the activity of this organ- 
ization, which has enormous resources at its disposal and which is 


supported by the bourgeoisie in America and other countries. This 
is the particular duty of our groups in those countries where Amer- 
ican imperialism is most strongly felt. In this way only, will we 
be able efficiently to counteract the pernicious work of this organ- 
ization. : 

Our comrades in China have a very difficult task. They must 
educate thousands of new members and instruct them in such a 
way that they can carry on the struggle victoriously. We have to 
reckon in China with a very strong Christian propaganda which is 
particularly represented by the Young Men’s Christian Associations. 
Our comrades in China have, during the last year, carried on a 
splendid campaign against this organization and also against Chris- 
tianity in general. 


If only the Executive Committee of the Communist 
Youth Internationale could have participated in the Hel- 
singfors conference, some of them might have come to 
the conclusion that the Y. M. C. A. had adopted a method 
of conducting its conference which would out-Bolshevik 
the Bolsheviks. 


For over two years the committee in charge had made 
a studied effort to achieve the maximum of democratic 
participation and democratic method in the preparation 
and conduct of the conference. The influences which led 
to this action were these: A minority of the delegates 
attending the annual meetings of the World’s Committee 
of the Y. M. C. A. in Utrecht in 1921 and at Copenhagen 
in 1922 were painfully aware of the fact that the war 
demanded a drastic overhauling of the program and 
methods of the Y. M. C. A. Asa result, the committee 
authorized a study of the extent to which the Y. M. C. A.’s 
throughout the world were proving a factor in the appli- 
cation of the spirit and teachings of Jesus to the solution 
of industrial, social, racial and international questions. 
As the study proceeded, in answer to the criticism that 
such an approach ignored the necessary background of 
personal religion, it was officially designated as “An 
Inquiry as to the Christian Way of Life in Personal, 
Social and International Relations.” 


By 1924 it had become clear to many that the Associa- 
tion could only function realistically in this inquiry if it 
began to re-examine and overhaul its own internal 
methods. Conviction grew that the organization could not 
suggest more Christian or more democratic relations in 
industry or between races and nations unless its own 
organizational procedure and life relinquished its former 
reliance on authority, prestige and tradition, and became 
free, scientific-minded and democratic in its own life and 
in its relationship to the youth of the world. The whole 
organization must be put in reverse. The very qualities 
which seem to be at variance with the spirit of Christ in 
industrial and political life were realized to be too often 
the dominating characteristics in the life of the Association. 
By 1925, therefore, the leaders who met in preliminary 
conference in May at Budapest were ready to urge that 
Helsingfors was to be approached not with an emotional 
exuberance over the organization’s triumphant achieve- 
ments, but in the leaner and more painstaking mood of 
scientific inquiry as to what part, if any, the Y. M. C. A. 
could play in finding a more Christian way of life for 
itself and the world. This automatically demanded a fresh 
study of the mind of youth, its perplexities and its ideal- 
ism, its defeats and its triumphs. Only on such a back- 
ground as this could the World’s Conference be a realistic 
step in the process of changing the World’s Alliance from 
a federation of isolated movements, each largely out of 
touch with the problems and achievements of the others and 
largely out of touch with the new spirit of youth, into a 


[58] 


genuine world movement. In such a union the national 
Alliances, sensitive to and really representing the youth 
of their countries, would be bound together in a world 
fellowship shot through with the spirit of mutual under- 
standing and skilled in the technique of cooperation. On 
this basis, the World’s Alliance might eventually become 
an aid to the youth of the world in substituting coopera- 
tion for conflict in the adjustment of industrial, racial and 
national differences. 


It takes but a short flight of the imagination to find a 
special meaning in the selection of Helsingfors as a meet- 
ing place, for only a few hours away are Leningrad and 
Moscow where another group has set itself the same prob- 
lem—to find a better way for men to live together. That 
group believe, it is said, that they have no need of religion 
in any form. They have pointed out the many failures 
in a professedly Christian society to provide justice for 
its members. Helsingfors had need for no further re- 
minder that there must be no evasion of issues; that it 
must be a quest for realities. Every step in the long 
continuing process of preparing for and conducting the 
conference had to be tested by this—If such a practice, such 
a plan, such a purpose became universal, would it make 
for better understanding in industrial, social and political 
life? Would conflict, war and jealousy increase? Had 
each step that was proposed the texture of which human 
cooperation and understanding are made? The confer- 
ence was to be just one event in a search which had had 
its flickering beginnings at Utrecht and Copenhagen and 
which was to continue through the conference into the 
following years. 


MAKING IT REPRESENTATIVE 


Now, if Helsingfors was to be in any true sense a world 
conference of the Y. M. C. A., some means had to be de- 
vised by which the rank and file of members, and not 
merely the 1,500 official delegates, might participate in its 
proceedings, for the official delegates could be represen- 
tative of their constituencies only if their own personal 
experience and knowledge were supplemented by active 
study in their communities. An international question- 
naire and study outline was prepared and sent out from 
the Geneva headquarters of the World’s Committee to be 
used in group discussion. It was an attempt to under- 
stand the mind of youth and, in the light of this, to dis- 
cover what transformation is required in the attitudes 
and plans of the Y. M. C. A. This basic questionnaire, 
containing 486 questions, was translated into about a 
score of languages. In its original or in a modified form 
it was used by thousands of groups for periods ranging 
from eight to eighteen months. In England alone, 12,000 
answers to the questionnaire were received. In several 
countries the use of the questionnaire encouraged, even 
before the Helsingfors conference, experiments with 
totally new methods of social and religious education. 
In some, discussion groups on a democratic basis, meet- 
ing in a somewhat scientific temper, were organized for 
the first time. “Authority” was being unhorsed. Youth 
in a mood of serious inquiry was attempting the saddle. 

A condensed summary of this mass of material has 
been published in a pamphlet of 142 pages, entitled “Youth 
and the Christian Way of Life in a Changing World.” 
Supplementary to this was a brief summary, entitled “The 
Younger Boy.” These, with a series of informational 
and data papers prepared in the light of the returns to 


the questionnaire, were published in The Sphere and sent 
to practically all of the delegates for their final study on 
the journey to Helsingfors. Fascinating as these sum- 
maries are, the committee was under no delusion as to 
their value as objective evidence. They were merely 
hints of a vital, world-wide process of democratic in- 
quiry. They were not verified data of scientific value. 
They represented an invaluable and creative process. 
They did not purport to represent finality. A majority 
of the groups, for example, made an initial assumption 
as to the uniqueness or superiority of the Christian religion, 
the Christian Church, and sometimes of the Y. M. C. A. 
Yet that there was a large measure of freedom is evi- 
denced by thousands of answers. 


Here are some from England, regarding the Church: 


The attitude of the Churches toward war and social evils, on 
which they take a very weak line, keeps away the masses of the 
people. 


The Churches fail to attract the men outside their ranks—men 
will not come in on the terms laid down by the Churches, which 
are not open to opinion outside their creeds. The beauty of faith 
has degenerated into a tiresome and stale formula. They do not 


ikea 


grasp the truth that “where the Spirit of God is, there is liberty! 


Its complacency, bigotry and wranglings fill us with disgust; it 
contributes nothing towards the world’s welfare. 


The Churches are the chief harbingers of snobbery. 


Chinese boys voiced these criticisms of Christianity: 


It is a kind of instrument to make China weak. 
- It is a camp of imperialism. 
It is a superstition and it always interferes with politics. 
It is not necessary in this scientific world. 
It is a foreign religion. 


The principles of Christianity are not practicable; therefore 
Christians are hypocrites. 


It is not a religion of equality. 

Advocating non-resistance, it is impracticable and non-effective. 
Does not fit Chinese customs. 

Christians tend to segregate themselves. 


Is too autocratic. 


In choosing delegates to Helsingfors, the World’s Com- 
mittee had urged that the national committees should in- 
clude only persons who had actually participated in the 
preliminary inquiry by leading groups studying the Hel- 
singfors questions. Scotland, for example, chose all its 
delegates, save two, a year in advance so that they might 
have a full ten months’ opportunity of getting the widest 
collaboration of youth in their own communities in the 
world-wide study. In January, 1926, leaders from twenty 
countries assembled for several days in Geneva to review 
the preliminary national reports and, in the light of the 
experience gained thus far, to determine the procedure 
for (a) the final period of preparation, February to July, 
and (b) the general method to be adopted for the Helsing- 
fors program. This conference prepared a fresh syllabus, 
based on the process of study up to date, and sent this with 
a complete bulletin of instruction to the national Alliances 
with the request that this syllabus, so far as possible, be 
used by all of the delegates in groups in their own com- 


[59] 


munities, and especially by those who were likely to serve 
as group leaders at Helsingfors.* 

At this meeting it was finally decided that Helsingfors 
could best achieve its main aims if the whole conference 
were broken up for the greater part of each day into 
small, internationally constituted groups which could 
really “confer.” Here again, the committee was mindful 
of the fact that youth could not readily function in finding 
solutions for big social and international questions if the 
very methods and processes of the conference itself were 
out of accord with sound processes of social progress. 
This decision involved the seemingly impossible task of 
enabling many who were wholly untrained in group leader- 
ship quickly to acquire a new skill. Practice in the use 
of the January syllabus, illumined by the full bulletin and 
suggestions to all group leaders, helped. But a further 
step was required. This involved invitations to 150 group 
leaders to reach Helsingfors four days in advance of the 
conference in order that a full two days might be given 
to a further period of experimental training. 


In this two days’ conference at Geneva there were con- 
sideration of the general plan of the main conference, 
discussion of the probable topics for the first two days 
and opportunity for mutual help on the methods of con- 
ducting the groups. As this conference proceeded, it 
became clearer than ever that it was necessary to provide 
for a real interchange of experience and conviction in 
order that every one of the 1,500 delegates might have 
the fullest opportunity of making his own contribution to 
the total thought of the conference. Frequently in a con- 
vention, even in one’s own country, the delegates from a 
particular locality associate together and come into very 
little contact with other delegates. In an international 
gathering, there is still more likelihood that the national 
delegations remain together, somewhat isolated from the 
others. At former world’s conventions of the Y. M. C. A., 
delegates had travelled thousands of miles, only to asso- 
ciate with the members of their own group on arrival. 
The question could well be asked—“Why should they go 
so far to do just what they might have done at home?” 
If association with members of other nationalities was to 
be left to chance, only the more aggressive individuals 
would form international contacts; but the division of the 
entire conference into small groups of thirty [more fully 
described below], meeting for a total of about sixteen 
hours of lively conversation during the four days, was to 
afford an opportunity really to enter into intimate fellow- 
ship by each delegate with representatives from a dozen 
other nationalities. The first condition, therefore, of 
international fellowship was to be met by an actual physical 
arrangement which would divide the entire conference 
into such internationally constituted conversational groups. 
In addition, some program for the days of group discus- 
sion was necessary which would give the greatest freedom 
for conversation in the groups and yet secure a measure 
of unity in the ground covered by the discussion. This 
involved a limitation of subject area; at the same time the 
invoking of some device which would ensure that there 
be no predetermination of the outcome of the discussion. 
Common fields of discussion were essential to unity, but 
what was discovered in these fields must be left entirely 
to the individual groups. 


The preliminary world-wide questionnaire and inquiry 
had brought a certain remittal of problems to the con- 


*It was used by probably only two-thirds of the delegates. 





PT HE SPIRITUAL significance of the Helsingfors 
conference was stamped all through the devo- 
tional sessions, the group meetings and the plenary. 
Whatever else the conference might be, it was un- 
mistakably a rallying of spiritual forces, to fight out 
the great battles of God in the new age we are facing. 
It was from a spiritual point of view that the most 
human problems of our day were discussed. And it 
was with a definite spiritual reference to the mind of 
Jesus that the gross sins of men and women, the 
shortcomings of our civilization and culture, and the 
inconsistency of our Christian living were mercilessly 
scrutinized. Even when disagreements occurred, as 
they should occur, the spiritual issues were empha- 
sized as never before in similar assemblies. 4 

The statesmanlike leadership of the conference, the 
daring study of many subjects that usually are 
academic issues or appear on the agendas of the 
assemblies of rulers of nations, were also a very 
peculiar feature of the Parliament of Youth. And it 
was wonderful to see how the younger delegates, 
with frankness, appropriateness and dignity, joined, 
with a perfect sense of freedom, their experienced 
leaders in the discussion of the subjects they were 
studying together. 


—From an account by Dr. Erasmo Braga, 
Brazilian leader, in the October number of 
The Sphere [organ of the World’s Com- 
mittee of the Y. M. C. A., 3, Rue Général 
Dufour, Geneva] which contains a sympo- 
sium on Helsingfors and After. 





ference: Delegates would come to Helsingfors in a rep- 
resentative capacity to consider questions referred to them 
by their own communities and, consequently, the Helsing- 
fors conference was to be in the nature of an international 
council of individuals who, in their own countries, had 
already considered some of these questions from a local 
and national viewpoint and who came to Helsingfors to 
consult with delegates from other nations. Consequently, 
the plan for the four days had to take into account the 
records of these preliminary investigations in “Youth” 
and in the other documents. 


It is needless to recount the number of hours and days 
spent by the organizers of the groups in the selection of 
leaders. In order to insure the international character 
of the discussions, it was agreed that two leaders, rep- 
resentative of two different cultures, should be in charge 
of each group. It was comparatively easy to arrange 
teams of two men having a common language for about 
thirty-five groups. Then the puzzle became more and 
more difficult. How much easier it would have been to 
entrust the leadership of each group to one man! But 
how evident it was even during the preparatory confer- 
ence, that the very efforts of two leaders to understand 
each other’s point of view was the best guarantee of the 
success of the group meetings. 


The organizers first of all attempted to find out those 
among the leaders whose names had been given by the 
national committees, who had had experience in leading 
discussions of the type of those that were to take place 
in Helsingfors. But they were so few! They belonged 
to two or three nationalities only! Some were obviously 
too young! Many spoke only one language! Several of 
them had no knowledge whatever of other cultures or 
religious creeds than their own! 


These considerations led to the idea of a team of three 


[ 60] 


men, two leaders and one recorder, to work together. 
Sometimes the recorder was to act as interpreter between 
the two leaders. Sometimes he was just an experienced 
man put in this position to help less experienced men who 
for other reasons had to be appointed as leaders. Ex- 
perience at Helsingfors was to prove that in many respects 
the function of the recorder was as important and as diffi- 
cult as that of the leaders. The integration of the work of 
the groups and the summarizing of each day’s discus- 
sion were only made possible by the good records of a 
large proportion of the group meetings. 


BRINGING ORDER TO BABEL 


The preliminary conference at Geneva, as it faced the 
problems likely to arise from this type of conference, 
was of one mind—that every effort had to be made to 
assure that the groups would represent an intimate fellow- 
ship of friends from a number of nations who had met 
together for conversation about questions of common con- 
cern. In no sense were they to be thought of as classes or 
formal meetings. If any one person was to monopolize 
the conversation by making a long speech, interest would 
lag, and the best results would not be secured. The 
friendly spirit of a conversation would be spoiled also by 
formal pleading or argument for a given point of view, 
for those who enter into debate usually seek only to win 
their points and rarely to understand and learn from 
others. An intimate fellowship could only take place when 
those present believed so much in each other that they 
could speak frankly and not carry on a polite diplomatic 
interchange, hiding their real convictions. Each delegate 
must be helped both to speak and to listen. He must expect 
to contribute of his own experience and convictions and 
equally to learn from others. Through the preliminary 
material sent to all the leaders and to the delegates them- 
selves, every effort had been made to develop this spirit 
in the groups. Instead of giving their attention exclusively 
to arguing for their own convictions, they were urged to 
adopt the attitude of inquiry and to seek, sympathetically 
and completely, to understand the spirit and convictions 
of others, especially those who differed radically from 
themselves. 


At the preliminary leaders’ conference it also became 
clear that whereas, when only two or three are engaged in 
a conversation, no advance plan is necessary, particularly 
if they have plenty of time, when twenty-five or thirty 
representing a dozen different nationalities seek to carry 
on a conversation, some plan of procedure is necessary if 
it is not to end in confusion. Some method, too, was 
required by which the general plan for the conference 
might be brought to each group and whereby the results 
in each of the groups could be reported to the others and 
all be enabled to take their full part in arriving at general 
conclusions. The business of the leaders would be not 
primarily to express their own points of view, but to 
get others to express theirs. Tests of successful leader- 
ship would be (a) the degree to which all of the members 
of the group contributed to the march of thought, (b) 
the degree to which every point of view represented in 
the group had its opportunity of finding expression, and 
(c) the extent to which at the same time the problem 
under discussion was kept clearly in the minds of the 
participants and the discussion kept from getting into 
confusion. A definite procedure, though without rigidity, 
was therefore planned. In order that all the leaders 


might cooperate in a common purpose, provision was made 
for a daily conference of the leaders. This was all the 
more important since the majority of the leaders had prior 
to this year never acted as chairmen of groups of this 
character. 


The world-wide inquiry had indicated that the main 
areas of conflict in the life situations of young men and 
boys were believed to be— 

1. Home and relations to elders; 

. Sex and relation between the sexes; 
. Life work choice and business and industry ; 
Sports ; 


Participation in national affairs; 


Aw RwN 


Racial and world relations. 


During the month immediately preceding the confer- 
ence, the Geneva secretariat of the World’s Committee 
had made a careful study of the personnel of the delegates 
from the point of view of culture, language and nationality. 
On the basis of this study, it was finally decided to divide 
the conference into fifty groups of thirty each. Each 
group would contain delegates from twelve to fourteen 
different nations and from the seven principal cultures 
represented in the conference (roughly defined as Latin, 
Teutonic, Slav, Scandinavian, Anglo-Saxon, Oriental, 
Negroid). The official languages of the conference were 
to be French, German and English. By design, the dele- 
gates were so assigned to groups that practically every 
group would have to be conducted in two languages, either 
French-German, German-English, or French-English. The 
committee deliberately decided to accept the handicap of 
language in order that every delegate might experience 
vividly the language difficulty in international intercourse. 
For each group there was chosen in advance, as we have 
seen, a trio of officers—a leader, a deputy-leader, and a 
recorder. Each team of three represented three nationali- 
ties and two or more languages. 


In fitting deference to the great and general hospitality 
which the citizens of Helsingfors and the Government of 
Finland had accorded to the conference, the opening day 
was given largely to such ceremonies as would enable the 
conference to give effective witness to its deep appreciation 
of Finnish hospitality and the stimulating political experi- 
ment which Finland is making in the family of nations. 
That evening the chairman of the conference presented 
a survey of conditions in the various countries and called 
attention to the significance of the strange and unfamiliar 
plan by which the main activity of the conference was to 
be carried on day after day in fifty small groups, each 
one of which would be a real international gathering in 
miniature. 


Firty LittLte LEAGUES 


Certain statesmen who are only partially content with 
the League of Nations are advocating the formation of 
five additional leagues. Had they visited Helsingfors 
on the morning of August 2, they would have seen no less 
than fifty small international leagues trooping out of the 
great cathedral, led by Finnish boy scouts, to the neighbor- 
ing school rooms which were to be the main theatres of 
the life of the conference. The physical arrangements of 
the conference in themselves were indicative of the new 


democratic note which is coming into religious education. 
The vitality of the conference resided not in the great 
assembly in church but in the classrooms of the higher 
public schools of the city. And even here the method 
of the conference involved material rearrangements. The 
democratic educational method necessitated the unscrewing 
in each room of thirty benches, row on row, converging 
on a teacher as the sole source of enlightenment and 
rearranging them into a hollow square or, more often, a 
circle, so that each member of the group should easily be 
seen and heard by all the others without the formality of 
getting up to face them. The first day’s program was 
planned (a) to secure a survey of the situations facing 
youth in the various nations so as to determine which 
interests and problems are universal and common in all 
countries and which are peculiar to particular countries, 
(b) to enable the delegates from each country to under- 
stand in full the situations in other nations as they ap- 
peared to the delegates from those nations and (c) to 
determine the areas of difficulty and conflict to which 
special attention should be given in the conference. From 
the whole list of suggested topics each group chose two 
areas for discussion the following day. Each delegate 
had been asked to apply three criteria in ranking the 
various questions—(1) its significance in his own country, 
(2) its world-wide importance and (3) the relative ur- 
gency of its challenge to the conference. 


Each day the groups met for approximately two and a 
half hours in the morning and an hour and a half in the 
afternoon, closing at 3:30. From 3:30 to 4:30 the fifty 
recorders, with the collaboration of the other leaders of 
the groups, wrote the report of the day’s work according 
to a common outline. Every afternoon from 4:30 to 6:00 
the 150 leaders of the 50 groups met in conference to 


HE DISCUSSIONS were held in a spirit of deep 

fellowship, of prayer, and of brotherly love. On 
all sides we found a real desire to understand each 
other, notwithstanding the impediments of language 
and different ways of expression, and to help each 
other to new light. We are deeply thankful for all 
that we have been able to learn from our brethren 
from other countries and for the enlargement of our 
vision that has been given to us, and we hope that 
the contributions that God entrusted to us to make 
and that we have made joyfully and freely, have been 
of some usefulness to our fellow delegates. 


On different occasions we had to face the fact that 
among us were important differences, not only in 
Christian experience and expression but also in our 
conceptions about important problems of inner life 
where we should have preferred to see inner harmony. 
But we remind ourselves with deep thankfulness of 
the unity in faith that was revealed to us, notwith- 
standing the differences, to a degree that far surpassed 
our expectations. Our unity rests in Christ, and 
we experienced this all the more as our impression 
of the pluriformity of contributions and conceptions 
grew deeper. The discussion groups have proved 
themselves to be an excellent instrument toward 
establishing close contacts between all members of 
our delegation and fellow delegates from all con- 
tinents and countries, so that everyone was able to 
make his personal contribution to the final result 
of the conference. 


—From the report of the German delegates to 
the German Associations. 


present oral summaries of the day’s work to supplement 
written reports. This arrangement enabled the leaders 
of each group to inform themselves of the progress of 
all the other groups and served also as a coordinating 
center for outlining the framework of the next day’s 
discussions. From 6:00 to 8:00 each evening a commit- 
tee of five teams of three each made a detailed study of 
the fifty written reports of the group work of the day. 
Each team contained one who could read all of the English 
reports, one for all the French reports and one for all the 
German reports. Most of the members of this Committee 
of Seventeen could read the reports in at least two lan- 
guages. After all of the reports had been carefully 
studied, the Committee of Seventeen compared notes and 
finally designated each evening three of their number, one 
for each language, to give at 8:30 to the whole 1,500 dele- 
gates assembled in a body a final summary of the day’s 
discussions. These three reports were not translations of 
a common version, but were three individual interpreta- 
tions of the total process. 

The attendance at the group meetings was as large and 
as well sustained as that at the joint meetings in the 
evenings; the attendance fluctuated from 79 per cent to 
82 per cent throughout all the sessions of the groups. 
Laid over against the standards set by the best groups, 
two of the fifty might be written off as complete failures. 
Of the remaining forty-eight groups, four or five were 
drab. But there was educational value in the failures 
and the semi-failures. With the aid of inspectors, each 
allotted to a number of groups for daily visits, spend- 
ing a few minutes in each, an effort was made to discover 
in which groups the discussion was proceeding smoothly 
and where, for one reason or the other, no progress was 
being made. In certain instances, as a result of this 
inspection, rather delicate adjustments in the disposition 
of leaders or interpreters were found necessary; and in 
some cases an individual was transferred from one group 
to another where he could be of particular assistance in 
stimulating a group, on which previously some inhibition 
had seemed to rest, to enter into the discussion more freely. 


LIONS IN THE PATH 


This is not the place to enter into a detailed report of 
the content of the discussions. The areas for discussion 
were so extensive and the diversity of experience so great 
that a volume of large dimensions would be inadequate. 
The readers of Tue INgurry can get access to this ma- 
terial in the official conference report and in the numerous 
interpretations that have appeared in the press, secular 
and religious. The emphasis of this article must continue 
on the nature of the process. The simple thread which 
ran through all the discussions and which, in fact, enabled 
each group to conduct a single discussion, instead of 
many, was this: (a) What exactly are the problems con- 
fronting youth today? (b) What precisely is the nature 
of the conflicting loyalties which makes it so difficult to 
solve these problems? (c) How shall we attempt their 
solution? (d) What contribution, if any, has Christianity 
to make? (e) In the light of the foregoing, just what 
are the task and problem of the Y. M. C. A. for the future? 

In spite of the process of study and inquiry which had 
been attempted in the different countries, many delegates 
came to Helsingfors not only as inquirers but also as 
evangelists. To them a divine revelation had been given. 
They were in no uncertainty as to the nature and implica- 


[62] 


tions of the Christian gospel. It would be difficult for 
them, they said, to remain in the fellowship of the World’s 
Alliance if they were not satisfied, as the conference pro- 
ceeded, that the views of all the national Alliances in 
great measure coincided with their own. The central 
principle on which the conference was organized was at 
first repugnant to such as these, and it should be added 
that it was equally repugnant to those liberals and radicals 
who believed that final truth had been vouchsafed to them. 
The presence of these two large, intelligent, convinced, 
flaming, authoritarian blocs in the conference at first 
seemed to threaten the success of group discussion. At 
the same time, they felt that this procedure prevented 
them from fulfilling their evangelistic mission and from 
discovering whether others rang true to their ideal for 
the movement. It was precisely here that educational 
miracles seemed to happen, even before the first day was 
over, and continued with amazing frequency to the end of 
the conference. 


Ponder again the advantage of deciding issues not on 
the floor of the whole conference, but largely in small 
groups. Think of the advantage of this system over the 
accustomed method of discussion in a great assembly or 
the sidetracking of burning questions by a diplomatic 
steering committee! Neither of the last-named methods 
really makes for an enduring understanding. The first 
gives an orator a chance to stampede a large audience 
(how easily it might have been done at Helsingfors!) or 
for a diplomat to confuse it with some astute political 
move, which the slower minds do not see until it is too 
late. The second method only postpones the real battle 
until the next conference. But in the small group, the 
orator and the spell-binder can be restrained; here the 
usually silent thinker can frequently interject that terse 
and quiet remark which deflates a hollow piece of verbiage 
as a small needle deflates a balloon; here the faddist 
eventually finds his own place; here the average man can 
obtain a chance to state the faith that is in him; and here 
it is possible for the leader to preserve the sense of in- 
timacy that gives and takes, rather than to indulge the 
magisterial temper that imposes its will on the assembly. 
Even preachers find it difficult to deliver sermons to the 
members of their families. There are situations in life 
where long addresses are not effective, and intimate dis- 
cussion groups testify to this fact. Helsingfors is prob- 
ably the first international conference to use so radical a 
departure from the conventional method on so extensive 
a scale, and yet to register an unqualified success. There 
are some who claim that Helsingfors has given to inter- 
national conferences a new method or, if you will, a new 
technique, which they cannot afford to ignore. Certain 
it is that leaders from a majority of the nations agreed 
with the remark of one of the oldest and wisest of all the 
delegates who said, “Helsingfors may, or may not, be 
the best way to run a national or an international con- 
ference, but the fact of Helsingfors makes utterly impos- 
sible for any one of us a reversion to the former con- 
ference and convention program.” 

These groups had to wrestle with the fundamental prob- 
lem in all efforts at international understanding—the prob- 
lem of language. The whole process of preparation for 
Helsingfors and the actual conduct of the conference it- 
self were naturally rendered extremely difficult by reason 
of the language differences. It must be remembered at 
the outset that the World’s Alliance of the Y. M. C. A. 
recognizes three official languages, English, French and 


German, although the League of Nations recognizes but 
two, English and French. Consequently, all preliminary 
literature issued in connection with the conference, in- 
cluding the original questionnaire, the reports on the 
questionnaire, the manuals of instruction to leaders and 
recorders, etc., had to be issued in these three languages, 
and the very problem of translation was, in itself, great 
and complicated. For example, there is absolutely no 
word in the French language which clearly describes what 
our group discussion advocates mean by a “leader.” The 
French use the word “chef,” but this word does not have 
the democratic sense of one who is primus inter pares 
such as the English word has. That language has not, 
as yet, distinguished between one who assures an orderly 
direction to a discussion from one who, more or less, 
directs, if not dictates, the course of the discussion. An- 
other English word which gave great difficulty, both to 
the French and the Germans, was the word “issue.” They 
found it exceedingly difficult to translate just what was 
meant in English when an “issue emerging from discus- 
sion” was considered. Possibly their difficulty was partly 
due to the different meanings which the word “issue” 
has in English, and partly it may have been caused by the 
difficulty of distinguishing significant situations, arising 
in the discussion and requiring adjustment, from general 
propositions for debate. 


The data-booklet prepared for Helsingfors had a sub- 
title “Helps to Discussion’’—a succinct phrase tolerably 
clear in English—but two French translators spent an 
hour trying to discover a terse way of expressing “Helps 
to Discussion” in French, and finally gave it up as im- 
possible. These are just a few instances of some of the 
casual difficulties that confront those who work in more 
than one language, and who seek today the development 
of international understanding. Further, at Helsingfors, 
the reports from the various groups were prepared, as 
has been intimated, in three languages. When these had 
been read and digested, and a summary of the day’s dis- 
cussion had been prepared in one of the three languages, 
it then had to be translated, often near midnight, into 
the other two languages before being handed to the printers 
or the mimeographers. Every step of the way, the lan- 
guage problem was a consideration. 


And even though at Helsingfors itself three languages 
were used in the groups, nevertheless, probably one-third 
to one-half of the delegates had to participate in a discus- 
sion in a language which was not their own. The large 
number of delegates from the Scandinavian countries, 
with the linguistic ability for which they are justly famous, 
might be able to speak French or English or German, but 
when they did so, the sentences they used very often gave 
only an impressionistic picture of what they were really 
trying to say. One fact that clearly impressed itself upon 
the minds of all the delegates was that those who desire 
to work for international understanding in this world 
have almost a moral obligation to familiarize themselves 
with some of those languages, other than their own, 
through which the souls of other people alone can find 
adequate expression. 


In spite of all this, to the amazement of all, the language 
difficulty proved a real aid to understanding. For, the 
speaker whose remarks are being translated begins to 
realize that he must be more accurate than usual. You 
cannot translate into French unless you know what was 
meant by the English or the German. A successful trans- 


[ 63 ] 


lation is not simply a matter of words, but a transference 
of ideas. Consequently, members of the groups had first 
to think clearly and then to speak slowly, simply and 
precisely ; otherwise the interpreter would not understand 
and could not transmit aright. Further, even with good 
interpretations, those who knew more than one language 
frequently came to the assistance of an interpreter, espe- 
cially if he erred in some slight inaccuracy. Every ear 
was trying to hear aright; every mind was tuned for 
understanding. While the language difficulty did slow 
up the process, it also made for understanding. It seemed 
at times as if the desire of the members to understand 
was in direct ratio to their difficulty in doing so. 


Then, too, one must remember how often what we be- 
lieve is a matter of words, as Gallio suspected when, 
according to the Acts of the Apostles, he told the Jews that 
if their dispute was a question “of words and names” they 
might settle it themselves. Words, around which the 
deepest sentiment and emotion may gather, often mean 
little when translated. One may make a pun in English, 
and have an interesting emotional reaction from the 


achievement ; but translated into French, the pun is not so 


exhilarating. In one group visited by the writer, a Ger- 
man member stated that what we needed today was not 
“Losung” but “Erlosung,” but half the emotional quality 
of the underlying idea was lost in translation. 

The very diversity of the views also made for under- 
standing. Had there been but two points of view—the 
German and the American, for example—understanding 
might have been difficult. But there were many others 
as well. Very often the enlightening word came from the 





ETROIT and Helsingfors are part of the same 

picture: A more democratic process in religious 
education, and in public organization for large social 
ends generally, is gradually enfolding itself; and 
many must be the incidental failures. 


Again, as in the last of these Occasional Papers, 
the larger part of the space is given to the reporting 
of a conference—not because of its news interest, 
though this is considerable, but because of its bearing 
upon the methodology of the Inquiry movement. 
Others have reported on this event from other 
angles. 


Incidentally, the report of this conference, to which 
several staff members of the Inquiry have given 
their time and effort during the summer months, may 
atone for the recent irregularity in the appearance 
of these sheets. In answer to a number of corre- 
spondents, it must be repeated that The Inguiry is 
not a paper that can be subscribed for—with the 
corresponding obligation of the editor to get it out 
at stated intervals. It is one of many forms of 
communication between the participants in our coun- 
trywide effort; one of the means we employ to 
spread the mood of inquiry into ways of applying 
our philosophies and religious beliefs in the actuali- 
ties of every-day life. If occasionally we ask for 
financial contributions—and we need more of them 
right now to close the year without deficit—it is for 
the general educational purposes and activities in 
which these papers play a minor part. 

Readers of these paragraphs who cannot afford a 
larger contribution will materially help if they will 
send, at any rate, one or two dollars to cover their 
share in the printing costs of the Occasional Papers. 





Latin or Oriental delegate, whose experience of life had 
been still different and whose problem so distinctive that 
his testimony completely changed the temper of the situa- 
tion. All this gave the conferees new angles of vision; 
they not only learned of points of view new to them but 
also began to sense the validity of points of view for which 
they had previously had no understanding or patience. 
Just as frequently in the League of Nations the smaller 
nations have pointed out the way when the greater nations 
had reached an impasse, so in this international conference 
the representatives of the smaller alliances—indeed, often 
the representatives of the so-called non-Christian countries 
—showed the way to the more powerful alliances in the 
so-called “Christian” countries. 


These are only some of the factors which contributed to 
the understanding attained at MHelsingfors but they 
deserve meditation and thought. 


On the first day of the conference, an English journalist 
remarked to a young American en route via Helsingfors 
from Yale to Oxford as a Rhodes scholar: “It’s all 
humbug, and I wish that I could only tell them so! This 
isn’t the greatest generation that ever lived. Youth hasn’t 
anything original to contribute to the thought of the 
world. It never has done anything but mimic its elders, 
and that is what it is still doing today.” Writing of the 
conference on the last day under the title “Democracy 
Makes Good at Helsingfors,” this Rhodes scholar men- 
tioned this incident and added that every one of his friend’s 
misgivings, as well as his own, had proved unjustified as 
the whole conference, by a procedure that served as a 
sensitive instrument of world interchange of thought, 
faced the complex questions that have been puzzling youth 
all over the world. “Every one has discovered that 
truth is a bigger thing than he or his countrymen have 
ever known.” 


The communist in Moscow who affirmed that the Negro 
question would be discussed at Helsingfors in order to 
strengthen the exploitation of the Negro in America would 
have revised his opinion had he heard an American Negro, 
in giving data to a meeting of the whole conference, state: 


It is a puzzled Negro youth who turns his eye inquiringly 
toward Helsingfors tonight. From South Africa he is asking 
how it is that many Christian leaders either through active 
advocacy or passive acquiescence give their support to such 
measures as the Color Bar Act. He does not understand the 
Christian conscience that has no word of opposition to restrictions 
upon land ownership by natives and no strong word of disapproval 
of the living conditions of native workers in the gold and diamond 
mines. 

The Negro of the United States is puzzled about a Christian 
leadership that has for more than fifty years without serious 
protest witnessed flagrant violations of the tath and 15th amend- 
ments to the Constitution (those protecting citizens in the exercise 
of the right of suffrage) while national or sectional conventions 
are held every year in the interest of the enforcement of the 
Prohibition Amendment. He further wonders why it is that these 
same Christian leaders have permitted an anti-lynching bill to fail 
of passage twice for lack of influential backing. 


He would have been surprised to find scattered through 
the groups Negroes from America, Negroes from South 
Africa, Negroes from West Africa—some of them lead- 
ing discussion groups—Negroes who were known on two 
continents as foremost in the promotion of educational 
plans which were revealing to blacks and whites alike 
how deterioration comes to both in the pathway of exploi- 
tation. Anyone who feared that the Christianity of Hel- 


[ 64] 


singfors was of the exclusive, arrogant, militantly western 
type would have changed his view when the Indian nation- 
alist, K. T. Paul, given the place of honor in conducting 
the conference opening period of worship, used selections 
for meditation, not from the Bible, but from the Gitanjali 
of Rabindranath Tagore in which the poet pours out his 
mystical and poetical soul in praise of the common Father 
of all mankind. , 


One American delegate, a student at the Sorbonne, 
wrote of his experiences under the title—“‘At Last a 
Y. M. C. A.” Two hundred and forty of the 1,500 dele- 
gates were under twenty-one. Contrary to the situation at 
former world conferences of this organization, over one- 
half of the delegates were under thirty. This was not, 
of course, completely a youth conference but a confer- 
ence which at its closing session voted unanimously that at 
the next gathering half of the entire conference should be 
under twenty. 


MERELY A STEP 


Helsingfors thus was memorable, but it had many limi- 
tations. Its preliminary preparation was probably more 
thorough and widespread than that of any former inter- 
national conference; but it was, nevertheless, more super- 
ficial than the importance of the issues demanded. The 
preliminary training of leaders accomplished wonders; 
but longer and more thorough training would have greatly 
enriched the whole process. The groups that made the 
most outstanding contribution were the Chinese, the 
Indians, the Negroes and the Czechoslovaks, but in an- 
other conference both the Orient and Africa should have 
a far larger representation. The conference was impover- 
ished, too, by reason of the boasted policy of the Y. M. 
C. A.—‘a movement by men for men.” A few bars 
have been taken down in recent years, and a handful of 
women were invited as official delegates. This small 
minority was almost lost, as it was scattered through the 
various groups. Only as the intellectual and social re- 
sources of the Y. M. C. A. and Y. W. C. A. are used in 
combination, will inquiry as to the mind of youth at future 
international conferences have that quality of comprehen- 
sion which is essential. 


Protestants and Greek Catholics were there in plenty, 
but the Roman Catholics were so few that they did not 
represent the strength of the Roman Catholic Church 
either in Christendom or even within the membership of 
the Y. M. C. A. Finally, the conference was the poorer 
because, with but few exceptions, it was limited to pro- 
fessing Christians. If some of the Hindu, Buddhist, 
Confucian and Jewish members who have done so much 
to spiritualize and humanize the Y. M. C. A. in their own 
countries had come in larger number to Helsingfors, it 
would seem as though there would have been an even 
fuller sense of the presence of the God and Father of all 
mankind. But, happily, Helsingfors was not an end, as 
has been repeatedly stated, it was but a step in a continuing 
process. 


Great as was the value attached to the results of the 
conference by a majority of the delegates, all recognized 
that the two years of preliminary inquiry and the intense 
discussions at Helsingfors had done little more than induce 
a mood of inquiry and a determination to carry through 
on a more scientific basis the processes already begun. 
The conference, therefore, gave a mandate to the new 


World’s Committee to set up such processes of research 
and inquiry, through both the World’s Committee and 
the national Alliances, as will lead to the permanent 
transformation of the program of the Associations 
throughout the world. 


Already the new World’s Committee is at work pre- 
paring study outlines which will enable local Associations 
to carry much deeper the inquiries already begun. Wholly 
new projects for literature are planned. Interracial and 
international regional conferences on the Helsingfors 
model are projected. The progress which the group 
process effected in the democratization of the whole 
World’s Alliance is having a certain carry-over in a 
greater democracy in national Alliances and local Asso- 


ciations. The superlatively rich contribution of the 240 
boy members of the conference will certainly move boys 
into places of increasing responsibility, nationally and 
locally. 

A proportion of those who came in an inquisitorial or 
evangelistic mood testified to their unexpected acceptance 
of the method of group discussion and the mood of in- 
quiry. In fact, one delegation which in advance had con- 
sidered the possibility of having to leave the conference 
mid-stream if the majority did not conform to their way 
of thinking reported to their home constituency that the 
method of group discussion had saved the conference and 
made it possible for them to continue their membership in 
the World’s Alliance. 


Attitudes Toward Prohibition 


An Outline for Group Discussion 


I. What are some of the attitudes represented in the 


group? 


1. Would you accept a drink of illegal alcoholic con- 
tent if offered you— 


a. at the home of a friend, privately? 
b. at a party? 
c. at a public eating place? 
d. where you work? 
Which, if any, of these opportunities come 
most often within your experience? 


. Would you buy a drink for yourself or your family— 


from a friend? 

at a place where you buy other provisions? 
at a restaurant? 

from a bootlegger? 


a. 
b. 
c: 
d. 
Which, if any, of these opportunities come most 
often within your experience? 


. Are there occasions when it is expected of you to 
treat others to drink? If so, what do you do in 
such situations? Cite actual cases. 


How do you feel toward people who buy and use 
liquor and how do you act toward them if they are— 
a. members of your family? 
b. old friends? 

colleagues at work or school? 
. casual acquaintances ? 


storekeepers, salesmen, organizers or politicians 
who want to be on good terms with you? 


A. 9 


© 


. In a political election or one in some organization to 
which you belong, would you vote for— 
a. a person known to be a bootlegger? 
b. a person who boasts about evading the prohibition 
law? 
c. an habitual drinker? 
d. a home brewer? 


[65] 


e. a person who takes an occasional drink? 
f. a total abstainer? 
g. an active propagandist for strict law enforcement ? 


. What do you, or would you, do to enforce or defeat 
the prohibition law? 


Would you bribe a policeman to escape punish- 

ment for breaking it? 

Would you tell other people where they can buy 

liquor? 

Would you tell other people how to make home- 

brew? 

. Would you help bootleggers and other law vio- 
lators to escape detection ? 

. Would you tell the officers if anyone you knew 
was violating the law? 

f. Would you take an active part in discovering and 

bringing to justice providers of illegal drink supply 

in your neighborhood? 


a. 


b. 


If you have done any of these things, relate the 
circumstances. 
II. What feelings or reasons underlie the attitudes 
disclosed? 


1. If there should be a division of opinions on the 
questions asked in the first part of this outline, what 
are the main reactions represented in the group to 
some of the larger, underlying questions ? How many 
in the group feel— 


a. That it is wrong under all circumstances to touch 

drink ? 

That it is wrong to touch drink when it is known 

to have passed through illegal channels ? 

That it is wrong to use liquor in public places but 

not wrong to do so at home? 

. That it is wrong to tempt others but not to take 
an occasional nip oneself? 

. That it is right for older people who have the 
habit to drink in moderation but wrong for young 


people? 


b. 


. That prohibition has been forced upon the people 
and that it is morally right to disregard it wherever 
one can safely do so? 

. That it is the duty of good citizenship by personal 
example and protest to disobey the eighteenth 
amendment as an encroachment upon personal 
liberty ? 


. What questions of general social responsibility and 
public morals seem to be linked up with this ques- 
tion of prohibition? How many in the group feel— 


That obedience to the law is the first duty of the 
citizen, no matter how much hardship, or even 
injustice, this may involve? 

. That it is the business of government, not of the 
private citizen, to see the laws enforced? 

. That the demands of personal conscience are above 
the law and must be obeyed when the two are in 
conflict ? 

. That upon the older folks rests the special obliga- 
tion of setting an example of righteousness to the 
younger ones, and that non-observance of the 
prohibition law has a bad effect upon others, no 
matter how justifiable one may think it for one- 
self ? 

. That a special obligation rests upon the younger 
people, who have not as yet been weakened by the 
effects of alcoholic indulgence, to deliver this 
nation, and eventually mankind, from the evils of 
drink? 

. That there are too many laws on the statute books 
to make it possible for the individual to know 
and obey them all, and that the intelligent citizen 
must use his own judgment as to which he must 
consider binding upon himself ? 

. That if a person is willing to pay the penalty, it 

makes it all right for him to break the law? 


a. 


III, How have the present attitudes come about? 


1. What part, if any, has your personal experience 
played in giving you those attitudes toward prohi- 
bition which you have described? Tell of typical 
incidents in this experience. 


. If your views have undergone a decided change since 
prohibition came into effect, what is that change, 
and what has brought it about? Has your attitude 
been affected by— 


a. a gradual recognition of the actual effects of pro- 
hibition ° 

b. a change in the thoroughness or method of en- 
forcement? 

c. newspaper and magazine articles? 

d. the opinions of your friends or of your boss? 


IV. What shall we do about tt? 


1. Go again over the questions asked in the first group 
(I, 1-6), and see whether this discussion has changed 
your attitudes in any of the respects that have been 


considered ? 


. Can the group agree upon what it is right or wrong 
to do in any of the situations that have been named? 


What steps, if any, can they take as a group to 
promote either the observance or the disregard of the 
prohibition law, whichever they are agreed in regard- 
ing as desirable? 


Through what other organizations with which indi- 
vidual members of the group are connected can they 
promote those attitudes toward prohibition which 
have been agreed upon as desirable? 


Don’t Throw Away Your Copies 


EVERAL Inquirers have written in to comment on 

the usefulness of some of the briefer discussion out- 
lines published from time to time in these pages. Others 
have intended likewise to use the outlines on suitable occa- 
sions only to find that their copies of THE INQurtRY had 
disappeared. Unfortunately, many of the older issues are 
now out of print so that the requests for additional 
copies could not be satisfied. We strongly recommend, 
therefore, that henceforth you keep a file—if you have 
not already done so—of these occasional papers and bind 
them up for future use and reference. 


Some of these outlines have been especially appreci- 
ated by groups of girls in industrial employment (a series 
on “The Worker and His Job,” April, May and June, 
1925). Two have been used extensively overseas because 
they deal with problems common throughout the world 
to people sensitive to the finer ethical factors in human 
relationships (“Superior People,” January, 1926, and “A 
Fellowship of Faiths,’ October, 1925). One outline 
(“Non-Resistance in Interracial Conflict,” June, 1926) is 
being used this fall by a number of colored colleges be- 


cause, while most of the educational literature on the © 


subject of race relations addresses itself to members of 


[66] 


the dominant majority, this outline deals with it from the 
point of view of racial minorities. 

In some cases, these smaller outlines have been the 
experimental wedge for larger projects—incipient or 
planned for the future (such, for example, as “The 
Church as a Fellowship,” April, 1925 ; “Ethics in a Depart- 
ment Store,’ June, 1925; “Men and Missions,” August, 
1925; “Shop Imponderables,” January, 1926; “Married 
Women in Industry,’ April, 1926). 

Of most of these issues copies are still available for 
Inquirers who desire additional copies for practical use 
with their organizations.* (There are also still available 
at the office of the Inquiry copies of the mimeographed 
discussion outlines, “The Fellows I Work With’’—popu- 
lar with senior groups in social settlements; “Race Atti- 
tudes in Children’”—mainly for parents and teachers.) 


There is another reason for binding and preserving the 
occasional papers of the Inquiry: On going carefully 
over the copies so far published we find that even in the 
short period of a year and a half they testify to a develop- 

*Tt will be much appreciated if readers who have spare copies of 


Tue Inquiry for March, August, September, December, 1925, or February, 
1926, will kindly return them to the Inquiry office. 


ment which it is very difficult to express briefly in abstract 
terms (though an attempt to do so has been made in a 
recent article in the American Review, reprints of which 
can be obtained on request from the Inquiry office). 


Use of Occasional Discussion Outlines 


From a number of letters attesting to the usefulness of 
these occasional shorter outlines, we select the following 
report of a discussion group in a small town of New 
Jersey as indicative of a practical method of combining 
this material with other available literature in cases where 
a group prefers to keep its program flexible instead of 
defimtely commutting it to a given subject over a whole 
winter, 


Discussion as outlined in the monthly sheet, THE 
Inquiry, has been held regularly. In many cases such 
discussion outlines have required two or three meetings 
for completion. Some discussions have been entirely 
oral, some entirely written and some a combination of 
both. In addition to these outlines, discussions based on 
topics in The World Tomorrow and Information Service 
(Department of Research and Education of the Fed- 
eral Council), Swords and Ploughshares (Fellowship of 
Reconciliation), and parts of And Who Is My Neighbor? 
and Missions and World Problems, have been used. The 
course of some of the discussions was as follows: 


A Fellowship of Faiths—Three meetings. Social dis- 
tance first tabulated in writing with the result that many 
did research work in regard to such words as “Shin- 
toist,’ “Brahman,” “Confucian.” Interesting questions 
grew out of the questions given. Much of interest was 
contributed as the result of thinking on degrees of social 
distance especially as between Asiatics and Western 
peoples. The most pronounced effect was that the ques- 


CONTRIBUTIONS to the Inquiry, ac- 
cording to the treasurer’s last statement, 
amounted to not quite forty-eight thousand 


News and Notes 


tion of religious prejudice caused much heart searching 
in regard to the habit of denominational demarcation 
among Christian groups. 


Down Our Street—Four meetings. No discussion 
throughout the year was provocative of so much individual 
interest. The social aspect of this subject necessarily 
touched every person involved in the discussion, and as a 
result many present declared themselves as having a new 
vision of “Who Is My Neighbor,” as well as of the social 
applications of the parable of the Good Samaritan and 
of the Sermon on the Mount. The subtle argument by 
which communities to a great extent shift their Christian 
responsibility, namely, that “compromise brings peace,” 
was expressed in this connection. It was much discussed, 
and various persons were convicted and were honest 
enough to acknowledge it, either of indifference in regard 
to Christian neighborliness or of fear of public opinion. 
in applying their inner convictions. An interesting ques- 
tion was given for consideration: “Is Christianity an 
established fact, or is it an ideal toward which we are 
working ?” 


Superior People—Two meetings. What constitutes 
superiority was, necessarily, the question which no one 
could avoid. A new light on what ought to constitute 
superiority dawned upon several. The whole discussion 
was provoking and compelling. 


These are but a few of the many discussions on eco- 
nomics, international relations, race relations, industrial 
relations. The two most obvious results achieved are: 
1. A number of individuals are developing a consciousness 
of the necessity of thought, and an elementary idea of 
the technique of thinking. 2. A number of individuals 
have changed their convictions as to the standards of the 
Christian way and are actually applying the higher stand- 
ard. 


“The Amoy was the first junk seen 
here since 1846, when a great Chinese sail- 
ing ship glided into the harbor here and 


dollars from January 1 to September 9 of 
the present year. Since that date other con- 
tributions have come in, and various promises 
have yet to be made good. In all, new gifts 
totaling $6,000 between now and December 
31 are required to meet the obligations of 
the present budget for the year. 


This may be a convenient occasion to 
remind our readers of a number of things: 
First, the Inquiry does not have, and never 
has had, the support of a foundation or 
permanent organization; it is supported en- 
tirely by voluntary contributions of indi- 
viduals. Second, THE INQUIRY is not a 
periodical to be subscribed for. These ‘“occa- 
sional papers” are quite incidental to the 
major purposes, and your financial contribu- 
tion, whether large or small, expresses your 
desire to participate in the general enterprise. 
Third, the Inquiry is recognized by the gov- 
ernment as an educational organization, and 
contributions to it may be listed for exemp- 
tion in your income tax returns. Fourth, 
quite a number of promising projects could 
be started or advanced more rapidly if the 
officers of the Inquiry felt assured of a 
larger support. 


Reprints from the American Review of 
an article describing the history and pro- 
cesses of the Inquiry, will be sent on request 
from the office of the Inquiry. 


Olivet, according to all accounts, was a 
huge success. The secretary, Amy Blanche 
Greene, feels very superior over a fellow 
Inquirer who, earlier in the year, told her 
that “questions of sex relations could not be 
frankly discussed in such a conference.” It 
has been done. John W. Herring, after the 
Olivet experience, now contributes to the 
Federal Council Bulletin in Hebrew. 


Watch Hill, the conference of the Fellow- 
ship of Reconciliation, also was good. It 
took the form of an earnest evaluation of 
the educational processes through which the 
ideals of the Fellowship have been promoted 
hitherto and of a canvassing of new oppor- 
tunities in the light of that experience. 


The sort of attitude which our oriental 
friends denounce at times as western ar- 
rogance is typically illustrated in the fol- 
lowing news item in the New York Times. 
{You will find worse ones in other papers. ] 


[67 ] 


almost caused apoplexy to the masters of . 
civilized vessels.” [The italics are ours.] 


Cecil B. DeMille recently told a party of 
Japanese business men who were visiting his 
Hollywood studio that “the motion picture 
is the greatest medium for promoting inter- 
national understanding. A scene taken in 
one country depicting a mother and father 
watching over a sick child will strike a 
responsive chord in the hearts of fathers 
and mothers the world over, regardless of 
national differences. Fundamentally, human 
experiences and people are the same the 
world over, and the motion picture is the 
best medium for revealing this fact to the 
world. If we understand the home life of 
each other, we cannot quarrel.’”’ What is 
wrong with this picture? 


As a postscript to the Inquiry’s study out- 
line, Why the Church? (or part of it), the 
following extract from a recent letter of 
a mid-western Inquirer gives cause to medi- 
tate. He does not, of course, expect that 
anyone can answer his questions. 


“The aspect which interests me most just 
now is the relationship between free inquiry 


and our established ecclesiasticism. To what 
extent is a denomination, and to what extent 
are associated denominations, willing to con- 
duct a scientific inquiry? To what extent 
is an inter-church representative free to pur- 
sue research in the spirit of science and the 
desire solely for the largest good? I am not 
thinking of the lack of freedom through 
occupation with detail, I am thinking of the 
subtle chains which bind all ecclesiasticism 
to the status quo. The problem of all co- 
operative Christianity is to make it genuinely 
cooperative and at the same time prophetic 
in its courage and scientific in its approach. 
That antinomy is one which is very difficult 
to resolve, yet it presents itself almost hourly 
in the work of a local church council. 

“Protestantism cooperates in many ways: 
Federal Council, International Council, 
Missionary Education Movement, Foreign 
Missions Conference, Home Missions Coun- 
ei OY YM Cr ALY. OW otGrAs sete men Lino, 
these are functionally fractions of the same 
total enterprise. Yet to what extent does 
commitment at the top to any of these enter- 
prises filter down into the attitudes of the 
laity and the clergy in the local congrega- 
tions? To what extent are the denomina- 
tions deliberately educating their people into 
an interdenominational loyalty? To what 
extent does the promotion machinery of the 
average denomination negativate its national 
commitments to these cooperative enter- 
prises? 

“How rapidly are these movements in- 
tegrating? If they were fully integrated, 
would they themselves become so ecclesiasti- 
cized as to be static? Must the spirit of 
free inquiry always be extra-ecclesiastic? 

“Why does the tone of Helsinefors seem 
so different from that of Stockholm? Why 
do the Y. M. C. A. leaders of Eurone breathe 
optimism and an air of acceptability to the 
powers that be, at the very time that we are 
told that European Protestantism as such 
is in dire peril? Is ecclesiasticism merely a 
necessary evil from which all of us should 
escape as largely as nossible? How can we 
rescue Christianity from Churchianity and 
at the same time maintain our loyalty to the 
Church? 

“All this is familiar ground to some of 
you—but what are the answers?” 


“Thank you for THE INnourrY issue of 
June, 1926,” writes a friend from India, 
formerly a student at an American university 
and engaged in a variety of occupations 
among us. “I read carefully these pages on 
‘Non-Resistance in Interracial Conflict.’ So 
many of those stories have been experienced 
by me, and I give out as my frank opinion 
that the best solution to avoid such un- 
pleasantness is to offer ‘non-resistance.’ I 
have found it has worked wonders in my 
case, though it was a very unpleasant thing 
in the beginning to swallow the pill of insult 
offered to me most heroically.” 


The discussion outline on attitudes toward 
prohibition [page 65] is being used in con- 
nection with an inquiry into the changes in 
family and neighborhood life that have ac- 
companied prohibition. This study, under 
the auspices of the National Federation of 
Settlements, is descriptive and intimate rather 
than statistical and comprehensive. Inquirers 
desiring to take part in it should communi- 
cate with the director of the study, Mrs. 
Martha Bensley Bruére, at 99 Park Avenue, 
New York, who will also be glad to send 


further copies of the outline to suitable 
organizations. 


Adult education has moved into the sub- 
ject of first concern in this winter’s program 
of the New School for Social Research in 
New York, with courses by Everett Dean 
Martin, E. C. Lindeman and Grace Coyle, 
Harry A. Overstreet and Leta S. Holling- 
worth. In addition, social and religious 
workers are crowding the classes of S. 
Ferenczi, John B. Watson, Edwin B. Holt 
and others on various aspects of psychology. 


In Wisconsin, the State Board of Health 
in one of its bulletins recruits participants 
in the Inquiry’s study of conflict in local 
communities. 


An experiment of far-reaching importance 
has been inaugurated by the Senior Teachers 
College of the Cleveland School of Educa- 
tion and Western Reserve University. A 
Division of Adult Education, directed by 
Alonzo Grace, has been added to the under- 
graduate program and offers seven courses: 
on the adult learning process and problems, 
on the principles of group discussion and 
other aspects, and including group discus- 
sion classes on The Character of the Amer- 
ican People (an ethnological treatment with 
special reference to Cleveland) and on The 
American Negro. Cleveland, true to its 
reputation for social pioneering, is the first 
city to offer such a course of study as part 
of a college curriculum. [But watch for 
our announcement, in the next number of 
these papers, of a similar course at Columbia 
University for the second semester. ] 


The Slavic Immigrant Woman, by Bessie 
Olga Pehotsky, (Powell & White, Cincin- 
nati), contains a detaifed accumit “of the 
steps by which a church organized itself to 
meet the needs of an immigrant neighbor- 
hood. While most of the program is along 
conventional lines, there are some items 
which will be found suggestive where similar 
circumstances prevail. 


We have to plead guilty—in good company 
—to the charge of the Christian Advocate 
that a “technical jargon” has crept into the 
discussion of religious education. “We have 





WHY wait until you receive 
the formal announcement 
of a new Inquiry publication and 


then have to order it? If you 
send now a standing order for 
every new publication, it will be 
sent to you fresh from the press, 
followed by the bill. 





heard,” says that paper, “so much prattle 
about ‘adolescent,’ and ‘stimuli’ and ‘psycho- 
logical complexes’ and about ‘data’ and ‘co- 
ordinate phenomena’ that we have been 
tempted to run for our life.’ We often 
wonder whether with the present advances 
of specialized knowledge there will soon 
cease to be a common language other than 
the slang of the streets—and that also tends 
to become specialized. It is all very well to 
demand a simple style—but how can we use 
“words with color and fire and music in 
them” when there is need for a more precise 
description of educational processes that have 





hitherto not been understood at all because 
of the vagueness of the terms in which they 
were discussed ? 


Settlement Goals for the Next Third of a 
Century is the title of a symposium and 
digest of discussion at the Cleveland con- 
ference of the National Federation of Settle- 
ments, published by the federation (20 Union 
Place, Boston, 50 cents). An interesting 
innovation for a pamphlet of this character 
is a digest of topics, with briefer quotations, 
which permits of a rapid comparison of the 
views expressed on the various topics cov- 
ered. 


Occasional excursions into facetiousness 
usually end by plunging the editor of this 
page into hot water. So we will merely 
state that, according to the papers, the Inter- 
national Advertising Association is going to 
make another effort, between Christmas and 
Easter, to “sell” Christianity to the world. 
The Rey. Dr. Charles Stelzle, who heads the 
campaign committee, is of the opinion that 
“never have advertising men had a cause or 
a commodity to sell which had a wider ap- 
peal than religion.” He also holds that “to 
proclaim religion is an advertising man’s 
jo D 

A Third Conference on Conferences is to 
be held at Pocono Manor Inn, Pennsylvania, 
November 3 to 7. It is by invitation—that’s 
why we do not mention it more prominently. 
But no doubt you will be invited if you ex- 
plain your interest to the secretary, Gilbert 
Q. LeSourd, Room 817, 150 Fifth Avenue, ~ 
New York. The main topics on this occa- 
sion are likely to be Leadership, and Evalua- 
tion of Results. 


Project Teaching is the subject of a spe- 
cial number of Keligious Education (308 
North Michigan Avenue, Chicago) which is 
well worth study, both for its discussion of 
principles and for the variety of suggested 
applications. 


Ethics of Investment is a subject of wide 
concern, as was demonstrated in the last 
few weeks by the publicity given to Pro- 
fessor Ripley’s views and findings on a 
number of aspects of the subject. The In- 
quiry’s Commission on Business and Indus- 
trial Relations is engaged in the promotion 
of group study of this subject and will wel- 
come the contribution of experiences or 
ideas which may help others concerned in 
the matter. A preliminary study outline on 
this topic is to be published shortly. 


Printer’s Ink for October 7 contains a very 
outspoken article on conference procedure 
by Percy H. Whiting, a member of the craft. 


College students who have spent their sum- 
mer vacations as manual laborers in Amer- 
ican industries, have met in conference for 
the first time early in September at Earlham 
College. The interesting discussions and the 
value of the experience are described in a 
report by the Rev. James Myers, industrial 
secretary of the Federal Council of 
Churches. 


Few readers of these pages are likely to 
have seen the suggestive article on The Con- 
tributions of Research to the Harmonization 
of Opinion by S. A. Courtis in the June 5 
number of School and Society. This excel- 
lent educational magazine, by the way, is 
edited by the well known psychologist, 
J. McKeen Cattell, and obtainable from the 
Science Press at Lancaster, Pa. 


